Chart-topper swaps his JCB for a tractor

HE has topped the singles charts, appeared on Top of the Pops and even shared a couch with Richard and Judy - but Nizlopi's Luke Concannon plans to spend his holiday cleaning out chicken pens and planting strawberries.

HE has topped the singles charts, appeared on Top of the Pops and even shared a couch with Richard and Judy - but Nizlopi's Luke Concannon plans to spend his holiday cleaning out chicken pens and planting strawberries.

"We've got a month off so I'm going to be working as a volunteer with World-Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms," says 27-year-old Luke who wrote the Nizlopi number one, JCB Song.

"I've done it before at a farm in Scotland - other jobs include feeding cattle and picking apples. It's great working outdoors and we have a good laugh. The idea of lazing on a beach in the Caribbean for my holiday sounds rubbish!"

While Luke labours on the farm, Nizlopi partner John Parker has an equally arduous task planned for his vacation.

"He's going on a pilgrimage to Santiago," reveals Luke who, like John, lives in Leamington Spa.

It's a typical un-rock 'n' roll scenario from an un-rock 'n' roll duo. They refuse to be signed by a major record label, preferring to release material on their own Leamington-based FDM Records - Folk 'n' Deadly Music - run by Luke's mother Sue and father Kieron who's an Irish folk musician and drove a JCB digger as a day job.

"Why would we want to leave the Midlands?" Luke asks. "We're completely into the music and don't want to sign away what we do to a major label.

"Yes, there's a lot of travelling in and out of London for meetings but I love living in a quiet town where I can hear myself think and not be distracted from my writing."

And it has obviously worked because Nizlopi have 30 new songs ready to record.

"At the Glee Club next week 50 per cent of the set will be new material and 50 per cent from our first album, Half These Songs Are About You.

"The new songs have a more folk/hip-hop/soul consciousness and are more political, dealing with such things as the global justice movement and fair trade."

The JCB Song is on the debut album and was originally released as a single back in May when it reached 160 in the charts.

The breakthrough came, says Luke, when a whimsical video, featuring animated crayon drawings, was made to accompany the song.

More than 600,000 people visited the Nizlopi website to download it, with the subsequent publicity pushing the song to number one the week before Christmas.

Says Luke: "All we ever wanted was for people to discover our music so from that point of view everything worked perfectly.